Free Serving HIM Vol. 4: Alpha Billionaire Romance by M. S. Parker

a smile and had to clarify my previous statement. I wasn’t ashamed to be with her, but I wasn’t making some sort of commitment either. “It’s a dinner party, Aleena. We both have to attend. Why not go together?”
     

Chapter 8
    Aleena
     
    Why not go together?
    Easy question, right?
    Except when I still didn’t know what ‘together’ meant.
    Now, after all those days of brooding and wondering why we hadn’t ever gone out on a date, here I was, standing in front of a mirror, brushing makeup onto my eyelids and half-wishing I’d told Dominic to find somebody else.
    Somebody like…oh, Penelope Rittenour.
    She would have loved to have gone to this party with Dominic. I could practically see her picking out wedding patterns. In the past couple of weeks, Dominic and I had traveled back and forth between New York and Philadelphia so often, I felt like I was running into my own shadow and when I wasn’t running into my shadow, I was running into hers.
    She seemed to have developed a radar and knew exactly when to be in the New York office, coming in just as we were or leaving a nearby spa just as we happened by. She’d dropped heavy hints about spending a day in Philadelphia and it would be so lovely to have some companionship.
    I, of course, had been completely ignored during these conversations. I hadn’t really minded, not wanting to waste the breath it would have taken to speak to her.
    The phone rang, pulling me out of my thoughts and I took the call, putting Molly on speaker so I could finish my makeup.
    “You haven’t gone and chickened out yet?” Molly asked. I chuckled under my breath and Molly laughed. “Come on. You’ve been wanting him to ask you out on a real date and now he’s doing it. Why are you so nervous?”
    We’d been up until midnight talking. I’d thought it would help settle the nerves. It hadn’t.
    “I don’t know,” I said, sighing. Straightening, I studied my reflection, angling my head left, then right. I’d made an appointment with a stylist the concierge had recommended. I hardly ever bothered paying somebody to do my hair, but this dinner party was important. Besides, I’d hoped the small bit of pampering would make me relax.
    It hadn’t.
    But at least my hair looked damned good, smooth and straight, pulled up and back into a complicated twist that I’d never have been able to manage on my own. Butterflies, bunny rabbits and buffalos seemed to be dancing around in my belly and I pressed my hand to it, hoping they’d get the point and settle down.
    “I should have said no.” Hindsight was such a bitch. “I mean, come on, Moll. He didn’t really ask me out . He was pointing out the fact that both of us had to go and that he’d want me there the whole time. Of course he’d need me there. It’s an important business venture.”
    “You’re being stupid. Of course you’re both working. If he didn’t want you to think of it as a date or anything, he just wouldn’t have said anything about it. He wanted to make sure you knew it was a date and wasn’t planning to bring anybody.” Molly explained everything with the same tone she’d use when talking to an idiot.
    Rolling my eyes at the phone, I thought about arguing with her and pointing out all the holes in that argument. But I caught sight of the time. Groaning, I said, “I need to finish getting ready.”
    “Oh, please do…hey, I’m hanging up. Wait! Face-time! I wanna see your dress.”
    I went to argue, but she’d already hung up. The phone chimed again and when Molly’s face appeared on the phone, I made a face at her.
    She wolf-whistled at me when I put the phone back down and turned to get my dress. “Love the panties, Aleena. So much sexier than what you usually wear!”
    I ignored her and tugged the dress off the hanger.
    I’d found it online a few weeks ago and bought it on a whim. It wasn’t a designer piece—or, well, it was, but not the sort of designer piece that Fawna had taken me shopping